Microbial ecosystems are found naturally in many places, including the digestive tracts of most animals. The starting point of this process is the microbial fauna found in the rumen organ of cattle and other ruminant animals. These natural microbial ecosystems are continuous processes and do not require sterilized feedstocks. However, natural microbial ecosystems found in animals are size limited by the host organism, are not actively managed to modulate the output materials, and cannot support extracting large volumes of chemicals or biomass for industrial purposes without detriment to the host animal.
Microbial ecosystems are also found in artificial environments, such as anaerobic digesters and activated sludge type waste water treatment plants. These installations can scale to large sizes but do not actively manage the mix of species within their microbial ecosystems, nor do they recover both chemicals and biomass for use in industrial products.
Accordingly, a need for replicating microbial ecosystems exists that addresses these and other issues associated with the prior art.